Come one, Come all: SATURDAY SHORTS have arrived

Hello ladies and gentlemen, Muldoon here with this week's cornucopia of awesome - a lovely assortment of shorts that I think are pretty damn good. While last week we screened all comedies, this week is more of a mixed bag with anything from a beautiful animation to a few music videos. So for the next hour or so, sit back, relax, grab some popcorn, and enjoy this little online film fest of ours! Remember, every one of these shorts was made by a fellow AICN reader, so if you dug a certain short, use the Talk Backs below to toss some nice words at them. So let's kick this shindig off, eh?

GROW TILL TALL

Up first we have a rather interesting short from Christopher Downes. "The animated tale of a tree that grows from a seed to the size of the entire planet. Set to Jonsi's song "Grow Till Tall."

SPANK ROCK - #1 HIT

Christopher Downes short was a beautiful blend of image married with a good song and on that note, here's SPANK ROCK - #1 HIT from Allen Cordell. Fair warning, this one's a bit out there - but that's why I like it and think you might too. Plus the song is damn catchy and will get stuck in your head like a starved earwig. Let's do this:

Cool, so let's give it a minute to let SPANK ROCK - #1 HIT sink in... Good? Okay, up next is IT'S A TREAT from director Luke Mayze. This little gem won "Best Comedy" at the New York City Short Film Festival in 2011 and recently just picked up an Austrailian National award for "Best Cinematography." It is in fact a treat.

Up next we have a short from director Toby Morris. Here's what Toby has to say:

"I'm a young filmmaker from Sydney, Australia. This is a short film I created as my graduate film for university a few years back. The idea was to create a children's film that was reflective of what kids actually wanted to see. I know when I was younger I loved films like The Matrix and James Bond films, not just films marketed at kids.

The production was a huge undertaking. When I submitted the script to our teacher he thought the idea was neat, but we'd obviously have to cut out things like the car chase and epic battle scenes... We had a great crew of students from Macquarie University, and everybody worked long hours to bring this ambitious project to life. I promised everybody that I knew how to do all of the visual effects aspects of the film, no problem. Then I would spend nights after the shoots going online to find tutorials and figuring out how to use After Effects. But in the end I managed to do them all and I'm really happy with how they turned out."

BEFORE SUNDOWN was a pretty fun/whimsical short that might've gotten you feeling pretty good, so let's turn a complete 180 and see what co-directors Jason Vowell & Wylie Whitesides have in store for us with their short: SCANNED.

"Computer engineer Peter Norton is on a routine business trip to Cleveland when he is randomly selected by airport security for a terrorist screening. Things soon begin to spiral out of control as he is interrogated by an inspector intent on proving he is a threat to homeland security. Just how far will the government go to protect us from the threat of terrorism?"

Hell yes, SCANNED was all kinds of cool. Sadly, now I must bring us to our last short of the day, VINYL WARS, THE BATTLE. I'm a sucker for claymation and think Rafael Terpins hit it out of the park with this one.

"This is the short film version of Vinyl Wars, The Battle. A Terpins Greco production co-produced by Cartoon Network. It aired in Brazil as a mini-series and it's going around the world as a short film. I've directed it and designed the characters. It took 4 years and a crew of 40 people to bring this to life. I'm still very proud of this work and I firmly believe that it will become an underground classic one day! Long live for Hip Hop!"

Enjoyed all of the shorts films, hats off to everyone involved, especially those behind ‘Scanned, (which was all kinds of George Orwell scary) and ‘Before sundown’ (A reminder of a childhood when playing pirates would change, for some reason, into fighting the Incredible Hulk and no one give a shit why or how the hell that happened). ‘It’s a treat’ was a hoot, but, how did that win an award for best cinematography?....or did I read that wrong somehow ?

Your name just came up in a couple of talkbacks, and it was all good.
Thanks for the shorts!
I think almost everybody is happy you're here- but if you start gushing about the greatness of The Lorax and "Awesome Free Stuff"-
PULL UP YOUR PANTS AND RUN FOR YOUR LIFE!

GROW TILL TALL: Hypnotic combo of lapse-dissolve animation and those modulating vocals. Too on the nose environmentally, and Roland Emmerich-y in the destruction. Beyond that quibble, I liked this one.
SPANK ROCK - #1 HIT : Had to bail on this due to choppy VIMEO embed, but I found it later on YouTube. As a song — catchy. As a music video — the electro-sample update of *White Lines (Don't Do It)* by Grandmaster Melle Mel. As a short film — no reservations, and the cast went for broke. Overall, not my cup of tea.
IT'S A TREAT: My fave in this batch. Great dialog, acting, direction, editing, and that perfectly timed/blocked reveal, holding its charm even through the credits. Really well done. Mayze's going places, if he's not there already.
BEFORE SUNDOWN: Definitely a major production. Kudos to all involved. Seemed conflicted as to whether to be rated G-rated or PG-13 regarding the ample violence. SUCKER PUNCH, junior, maybe? Creatively sampling a bunch of different John Williams/John Barry cues for each genre's recognition may have punched this up a bit in the whimsy department. As stated, a huge undertaking for a school project so, again, hat's off for that.
SCANNED: This was a strong effort I would have liked it better if it was tightened-up for only the circular/evasive dialogue slowly suffocating the detainee. With the physical abuse, skull scanning and such you figure out how this is going to end pretty early on. Maybe I'm presuming that Gitmo and Abu Ghraib prisoner conditioning is common knowledge, now? Anyway, the black comedy aspect could have engaged me better, and maybe that's because it was a little soft in the acting. Very well made — technically tops.
VINYL WARS, THE BATTLE: Nicely rendered alternate universe. Definitely a labor of love. How in the hell do you mark animation exposure sheets for *scratching*??? Those must have been *dope* sheets, for sure. Well done.

@JML - Kickass write up there on your thoughts. I'm sure some of the filmmakers appreciate the feedback. I know my taste might not match any one else's, but I'm glad you like a majority of the shorts.
@Rrl - Thanks for the kind words man - while I might occasionally talk like a frat boy, I don't plan on shilling out any time soon.

I'm just glad so many people have sent me their shorts. Every time I check my email, there's a new short that I seem to fall in love with. As far as people checking them out, I don't know - if I can put a cool film in front of just one person who might not have otherwise seen it - I really can't complain.